Biology

Physiology

Beedrill mostly resembles a bipedal wasp; however, it only has four legs instead of six and lacks pigment pits. Beedrill's head is round with a slightly pointed mouth, with large, shiny red eyes and antennae in the shape of the number 7. Its legs are connected to its body by its thorax, and the first two are tipped with long, conical stingers. It stands on its other two legs, which are long, segmented and insect-like in shape. Beedrill has two pairs of rounded, veined wings, and another stinger on its striped abdomen.

Behavior

They are highly territorial and normally live in colonies. Disturbing a swarm of Beedrill will cause the whole colony to attack. Beedrill is depicted as being very quick, so it's extremely difficult to avoid its attack after approaching its nest. They seem to be especially concerned with the welfare of Weedle and Kakuna, as shown by their tendency to respond aggressively towards those that disturb them.

In the manga

In The Electric Tale of Pikachu manga

In the The Electric Tale of Pikachu manga, Ash caught a Beedrill in Kanto, and it was part of a swarm that he had disturbed when he caught a Mankey. He thought this Beedrill, along with Mankey, would help him to raise his Trainer level, but it couldn't.

In the Pokémon Adventures manga

A herd of angry Beedrill attacked Red because Saur accidentally hit their hive. Both the Trainer and his Pokémon were badly stung afterwards.

Later, Giovanni uses a Beedrill twice, first against Red at Viridian Gym, then against Lance on Cerise Island. Giovanni has stated that one of his most treasured and strongest team members is a Beedrill he caught in his childhood from Viridian Forest, which eventually helped Yellow who was also facing Lance. It is also one of the few members of his team that isn't a Ground-type.

Trivia

Beedrill can be seen as a parallel to Butterfree. Both of their unevolved stages evolve into their respective first evolutionary stages at level 7, which then evolve into their respective final forms at level 10. They both also go through metamorphosis-like evolution and share a base stat total of 385.

In Pokémon Conquest, Beedrill is the only Pokémon that is featured without its evolutionary relatives.

Origin

Its design appears to simply be a stylized bee or wasp. However, it has a much closer resemblance to an Asian giant hornet. Its Shiny form may be based on the Agapostemon, as both are green in color.

Name origin

Beedrill is a combination of bee and drill (indicating its needle-like arms).

Spear refers to its stingers. In addition, the reverse of スピアー is アピス Apis (the genus for the honey bee), though it is unknown if this was intentional.